Artist feels rushed by a retrospective

By ANDREW CLIFFORD




After just 14 years of exhibiting in dealer galleries, Shane Cotton, not quite 40, has become one of the hottest names in New Zealand painting, often mentioned in the same breath as such veterans as Ralph Hotere and Bill Hammond.

Cotton's popularity has risen so rapidly that there has already been a major retrospective exhibition of his work, accompanied by a substantial publication that most established artists would be proud of after twice as long in the industry.

The show, which surveys his career from 1993-2003, first opened at Wellington's City Gallery, and is considered one of the exhibition highlights of the year.

It opens at the Auckland Art Gallery this weekend, giving audiences the chance to assess the work of an important artist at a relatively early and significant point in his career.

When we talked to Cotton he was unfazed about the imminent opening of such a big showing of his works.

He took advantage of a clear autumn afternoon to mow the lawns of his Palmerston North home, where he has lived since 1993 with his wife and two daughters.

When the Wellington gallery approached him about putting together the retrospective, Cotton was reluctant.

"A retrospective is something that an older artist does, and I didn't really want to be pigeonholed as an older artist," he said. "I didn't see myself as that, in terms of my career.

"I suppose the worry is, when you gather together that body of work and you situate it in the same place, your work becomes very tied down to a certain look. It can become very easily pigeonholed and historicised and I wasn't really keen on that occurring."

Cotton's fears that his work would become stereotyped turned out to be unfounded and, in many ways, the show has had the opposite effect on audiences.

"It was quite good to hear feedback that people weren't as aware of some of the things I had been doing."

One of the greatest surprises of the exhibition was the newest group of works, which point to fresh approaches.

Viewers familiar with Cotton's work will notice the appearance of colour. Years of dark, burnished landscapes and images in monochromatic or sepia palettes have given way to bright oranges, vivid greens and deep blues.

Cotton has also shifted from painting entirely in oils to exploring acrylics, sometimes applied with an airbrush.

"All those sorts of things just happen out of the process of the painting," he said. "You want to maintain your interest in your practice and you want to maintain your interest in what it is that you do, so you are always looking for different ways to express and present an image."


Another unique opportunity that presented itself to Cotton last year was a request from friend Moana Maniapoto to create an album cover for the singer.

"I said, 'Look, I'll tell you what. I don't do cover designs but I'll do you a painting. If you like the painting you can take it to a designer and they can design it appropriately for a cover.

"She basically just said paint what you want, and so that's what I did ... It took a wee bit of coming around for her, I think."

This is as close as Cotton has come to the world of commercial art, which is surprising considering his name is always one of the first mentioned in any discussion about the local art world as a marketplace.

Cotton's work is highly sought-after by collectors. His exhibitions usually sell out quickly and works rarely appear for auction.

But Cotton pays little attention.

"What happens to the work once it's out into the open market ... the market decides all those things. Some of the prices people are paying for things astound me - I don't really understand it myself.

"You do get a bit pissed off with people and the way they treat you as a commodity, I suppose. But that's the nature of the beast and you just can't really do anything about it.

"It's really good having genuine collectors out there who just buy the work."

It would be easy to assume that Cotton is one of the few artists in New Zealand to make a living exclusively out of their art but he still teaches at Massey University for the bachelor of Maori visual arts degree, a course that had just been established by fellow Maori artist Robert Jahnke in 1993 when Cotton started there.

"It's not out of economic necessity. I maintain my ties with Massey because, obviously, I have friends that still work up there and I still like to maintain an involvement with teaching, in terms of having connection with students and fellow workers."

Cotton has clearly been unaffected by his success. Chances are, if the curators waited another 10 years, he would have been equally hesitant about his readiness for a retrospective.

And he would still be teaching and mowing his own lawns.

THE SHOW

* What: Shane Cotton survey 1993-2003

* Where and when: Auckland Art Gallery, May 29-August 8